Lazy Day..

We have had a glorious sun-shiny weekend, which I have taken advantage of!

I have washed one of my four new shetland fleeces, purchased from Jamieson & Smith
Now washed & dried I have begun the slow & theraputic carding process.



Here are some of the rolags, all ready to spin. Soft as can be, like wee puffs of air!



I picked a pot full of dandelion heads. My intentions are to spin a 2 ply jumper yarn from all my shetland fleeces & take advantage of the natural colours. I have one fawn, one pale grey, one white & one that is possibly white, or could be more of a natural or beige, or - who knows, 'till it is washed!



The dandelions are all cooked & I will leave them in the cooking liquid for a day or two to steep, before straining & reserving the liquid for dyeing at a later date.



I found an inspiring blog post detailing dyeing with dandelions.
Liberty's Yarn, has a great tutorial for dyeing yarn.

Well, I am back off into the garden to carry on carding.
Have a super day whatever the weather.

An update:
My friend Helen owner of My Heart Exposed Yarns left me some wonderful tips for dyeing with dandelions in the comments section.
Here they are:

"I am very excited you are trying dandelion dye Lynn, some tips for you, after your flower heads have been steeping for about 24 hours, pop in either a sliced lime or a sliced lemon without the pips and allow to steep for as long as possible, minimum of 24 hours more though.

The lime and lemon give the liquid a beautiful glowing delicate yellow colour causing the pigment in the dandelion stamens to really come alive when applied to fibre for dyeing.

Also, next time instead of using alum mordant, soak your fibre in a cold tea solution made by boiling about six tea bags on the cooker in some water then allowing to cool to room temperature before soaking the fibre. When you then apply the dandelion and citrus liquid to the pot the fibre turns a beautiful amazing burnt sun gold colour which is so unique it cant be described or repeated, will be different each time because using tea bags is not an exact science as you personally dont know the precise measurement of ingredients which make up each tea bag."

Thanks Helen!